SB Nation User Blog: IceDubs

Tank?! Seriously?

IceDubs — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 07:34:22 -0000

Just wanted to post on the obsurd idea that rooting for the Warriors to lose every night has very little positive outcome. Below are three reasons why "trying to get a better draft pick" could just as easily screw things up much worse.

No Historical Basis

When was the last time you have heard of a team in the NBA that decided, around the all-star break, to just give up on the season, and then were rewarded during the off-season?

It's acts like this that can keep free agents away from the Bay, because who prefers to sign a contract with a team that promotes losing? (We have a hard enough time with our teams history as is!)

Some people have pointed out that Boston and Memphis both purposely tanked games to try and get Greg Oden/Kevin Durant, and both teams were left out of the lottery's top three despite having the two best chances for a spot.

via the hype at wordpress.com

In 2006, the Trail Blazers had the worst record, and they were also left out of the top three. In 2005, out of the three worst teams in the league (Atlanta, New Orleans, and Charlotte) only the Hawks had there ball bounce right, and they received the second pick; only, because of perceived team needs, they passed on both Chris Paul and Deron Williams.

The last time a team with the worst record won the lottery was 2004, and yes, they drafted Dwight Howard, but they won 21 games that year. The basic point of this is simply that the draft lottery, as well as the draft itself, is way too random and unpredictable to warrant deliberately losing games the season prior.

Weak Draft Class

To make matters worse, scouts all over the NBA have been saying for quite some time that this years draft class is looking to be very weak. The favorite to go number one overall all season so far, Blake Griffin from Oklahoma, was on many boards not even rated as high as Anthony Randolph in last years draft, before Griffin removed his name.

Courtesy of Funkyewok

Looking beyond, very few players stand out as difference makers. Ricky Rubio is highly touted, but there is still a significant chance that he wont declare this season due to issues with his Euro contract and buy-out problems. Greg Monroe is a high-potential PF with ball skills, but has hustle issues and even at Georgetown this season has had many games against good opponents when he disappears. He only managed 3 rebounds in 27 minutes against a small Tennessee lineup early on, and 4 rebounds in another loss to Marquette.

Hasheem Thabeet is a major shot blocker and large body, but also has disappeared against decent teams, and has very, very little skill on the offensive end. James Harden is a favorite of mine, but he is slightly undersized for a shooting guard (the same type of player that makes up half our roster) and isn't very atheletic to boot. Beyond that, there isn't any other players that are close to being sure things, or are even predicted to have a ceiling high enough to be an NBA starter.

Why would we continue to lose games on purpose if the end prize is just another player with holes in his game and isn't an all-star caliber player?

Warrior Brass screwed as is

Tanking games will also give rise to more issues than are already present in the front office. If we keep losing, Don Nelson's job may even be in some jeopardy, and I know that many readers here would like nothing better than a Nelson axing, but that only creates more losing.

Think about it this way. If Nelson is the head coach, we will spend all of this offseason and next season pushing to win a lot of games (aka, try to make the playoffs). Lenny Wilkins record on 1332 wins for a head coach is not that far away from Nelson current 1295, and you better believe Nelly will be motivated to not just reach that point but move well beyond it; he is a competitor and knows that if his win total is only a handful of games higher than Lenny's there will still be a lot of room for debate over who was a better coach.

Beyond that, if Nelly were to leave, that would make for a huge front office turnover. Mullin is already as good as gone with the way things have happened over the past year. When was the last time an NBA had that much turnover and was successful the following year?

Who would coach this team? Sidney Moncrief has greatly improved our team shooting (particularly from the line) and Keith Smart has begun to turn things around on the defensive end, but there is a reason neither even entered the conversation as so many head coaching positions opened up in the last year. And although I personally think Keith Smart will one day make a great head coach, hopefully for the Warriors, giving the reigns to someone else right now will only prolong the losing for another few years.

So, why tank?

PER - Brandan Wright

IceDubs — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 23:17:16 -0000

Just a few musings while looking at stats on ESPN.com.

According to John Hollinger's PER rankings (look on ESPN.com if for some reason you haven't heard of his little weight stat systems), Brandan Wright is currently the 28th most productive player in the minutes he spends on the court, with a 20.52 rating. He is also second on our roster to Andris Biendrins at 20 overall (22.15).

Sad to say, the next two players are currently Anthony Morrow (93rd, 16.23) and Marco Belinelli (96, 16.09). After that comes Jamal Crawford and Corey Maggette, who are pretty much right at the league average.

What does this mean? It seems to me that Nellie likes to really, really baby his big men, and Brandan Wright is following closely in the footsteps of Andris, whom if you remember was an annual case-in-point for Hollinger and ESPN saying that the guy needed more minutes on the floor.

Before everyone starts calling for Nellie's head again, remember that this is a measure of statistical effectiveness, and if Brandan was starting and playing more, his numbers would surely go down as he would be facing the All-Star PFs out west, as well as just being on the floor more and possibly losing focus.

At the same time, it seems pretty perplexing that he doesn't get a bit more consistent burn since he seems to be making a lot of plays and is effective. He is a decent rebounder because of length, but still gets pushed out of position a lot. An argument last year could have been that he isn't very versatile offensively and duplicates Andris in our offensive system. But with a change in offensive philosophy, and his much improved mid-range game, if his minutes dont increase to closer to 20 per game once he gets his legs back from the flu, questions should really be raised.

Trading Mr. Harrington

IceDubs — Fri, 16 May 2008 23:32:08 -0000

I do agree with much of the posting here at GSoM that Al Harrington is the most likely to be traded this offseason, as he will be playing out the last year of his contract and is a proven commodity.

I personally think, though, that Mully wont get any offers that help us the way Al could next season, since very few trades in the NBA are equally beneficial and help both teams immediately. I've seen some ideas bounced around like trading Al for another veteran forward, but realistically, the only time a veteran is traded for a veteran is when they play very different positions (think point guard for power forward).

The only way I see Al leaving Oakland is if we trade him in a similar fashion to how we traded JRich last year. As in, finding a team who is far under the cap and trading them Al for a trade exception/draft picks/future considerations. There are two teams that I can see thinking twice about taking on Al and his hefty contract, and (surprise) both are in the eastern conference. Let me know what you all think about the odds...

Philadelphia 76ers:

They are WAY under the cap going into this offseason, and are also riding high with their late season success and playoff birth. They have a very young team, and also a new GM who is going into his first offseason with the club. Although they still need to wrap up Andre Iguodala, and one of their needs this offseason is to upgrade at the power forward position. Al seems to be a decent fit for their fast pace, and they really dont have anyone currently on the roster who fills the 4 nicely (Thaddeus Young to me seems more like a 3). They could offer us their first round pick, plus the posibility of another pick (maybe give the Warriors the right to swap picks in 2009). Realistically, the Sixers want to persue Brand or Jamison in the off-season, but Al would probably be the next tier down if Brand doesn't opt out and Jamison looks like he is gonna resign.

New Jersey Nets:

Now that Jason Kidd is off the books, the Nets (surprisingly) have some cap room to mess around with. (Although I'm still not sure about that Keith Van Horn contract, if anyone has official info, please let me know). They are in dire need of a scoring option that can play in the front court, and I would think pairing Al with Carter and Jefferson on the wings could be a really good thing for them. Plus, Al's contract would come off the books in time for a run at LeBron. They will most likely end up with the 10th/11th pick in the draft, and I personally think thats good value for Al. At this point it would be speculation, but we could use our two picks to grab a point and a forward at the back end of the lottery with our two picks (Russell Westbrook/Donte Green????) which might be good fits long term for us.

I would really think that the New Jersey deal might actually be a good trade for both teams, but lets see what you think.....

Harping on the JRich Trade

IceDubs — Mon, 12 May 2008 21:56:16 -0000

This is my first-time post, and I've only been reading GSoM for a few months now, so I figured instead of throwing up a crazy trade idea I'd get a thread going on the other topic everyone seems so opinionated about.

The dreaded JRich draft-day trade.....

I gotta admit that I'm getting a little annoyed with everybody thinkin that we shouldn't have traded Jason last year, and how we would have/ could have/ should have been a better team with him on the roster this year. And before anybody jumps all over me, let me state that JRich was the sole reason a lot of us were Warrior fans in those lean years, and he carried us through some tough times. I love the guy to death, and he deserved to be treated with more respect than how things went down. Unfortunately, the NBA, as well as this fan site, is much, much more of a what-have-you-done-for-me-lately type of place. Respect and loyalty holds almost no weight in comparison to results and money.

So on that note, the JRich trade was the correct move, regardless of whether or not BWright developes into a 20 ppg player. Let me explain why....

With JRich on the roster this year, our "big 3" wouldn't have magically become the 'big4'. Monta Ellis' growth would innevitably have been stunted, because he simply wouldn't have gotten the touches or even the minutes to do the things he did this year. Jax wouldn't have been as effective, as he would have been playing power forward half the time and also getting less touches. Even JRich wouldn't have put up close to the numbers he did in Charlotte this year, because he wouldn't have had a chance to put up 18 shots a game. All this is a huge reason why he was deemed expendable.

On top of it, he is 27 years old and had just come off a season partially lost due to a knee injury that was taking forever to heal. Yes, he did play all 82 games this year, but at this time last year everyone was still worried about his injury history. At his position, and the way he plays, as soon as he cant elevate off the floor his career will be all but over.

As if all of the above wasn't enough of a reason to trade him, between him, Baron, Jax and Al, they were making a lot of money (I think about 80%of the payroll). We needed to cut some costs, and its been to do this early rather than too late, when you cant get any value for your guys.

And to boot, we were about to completely drop his contract on another team (something that rarely happens in the NBA these days) AND get a big-time prospect at a position of need.

In the end, to me, the trade makes a heck of a lot of sense, and realistically doesn't need any defending. The Warriors 06-07 roster wasn't going to get any farther than it did, and realistically shouldn't have gotten that far. Our 07-08 team was a better team, despite the fact that it was more of a rebuilding year for us. How can we look at this years team and say it was a failure? We won 6 more games in a conference that saw improvements from a bunch of other teams. Our future is much brighter now than it would be if we didnt trade JRich, and we wouldn't have been better this year with him.

Objections?